Reviews and Press Clippings

 Written by Christopher Arnott,  New Haven Theater Jerk

 posted Thursday, August 25, 2011

Measure for Measure review

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The Art of the Matter
The New Haven Review/The New Haven Independent- by Bennett Lovett-Graff, May 4, 2010

“Art” by Yasmina Reza first appeared...on Broadway on March 1, 1998. The cast was stellar for this three-person play, performed without intermission. The six-month Broadway run included Alan Alda, Victor Garber, and Alfred Molina, all well known film and theatre performers.

The recent weekend performances of the play at the Kehler-Liddell Gallery in Westville this April were perhaps a little less glamorous but were easily just as powerful as its Broadway version—in some ways even more so. Where the Royale Theatre seats 1,100, Kehler-Liddell’s impromptu bleachers and 60 some chairs transformed what on Broadway can only have been an all-too-impersonal experience into an intimate tete-a-tete between audience and performers. Placing the play within a gallery reflected, if anything, the mutual trust exhibited by gallery staff and the Elm Shakespeare Company, which was responsible for this production.

This element of trust is no small matter in a play as powerful as Reza’s. The setting is simple enough: the living rooms of the three characters—Marc (James Andreassi), Serge (Tom Zingarelli), and Yvan (Raphael Massie)—which remains unchanged throughout the hour and twenty minute performance...[the play] goes after the relationships among the characters...evoking a range of emotion that drives them through the convolutions of feeling that by play’s end leaves the audience near breathless with the verbal pyrotechnics of it all.

This is where mastery of the material makes all the difference, and the ensemble put together for this production really does have firm control of that material. The snugness of the venue and the simplicity of the set demand a conciseness of body language that is belied by the explosiveness of the characters’ pent-up feeling. The contrast of so much energy to be conveyed in so contained a setting ultimately creates a bond between players and spectators that only a great performance in the right environment can convey.

This simpatico between audience and ensemble seems exactly the intended goal of this experiment by Elm Shakespeare Company and Kehler Liddell Gallery to bring high art of high quality to New Haven’s neighborhoods...

For full review, go to:
http://newhavenreview.com/index.php/2010/05/04/1818/

“Holiday” by Philip Barry
New York Theater Scene - by Irene Backalenick, August 25, 2009

Shakespearean companies are flourishing in Connecticut this summer, as theatergoers pack their picnic suppers and ensconce themselves in one of the many park settings. One fine example is the Elm Shakespeare Company in New Haven’s Edgerton Park. Though Shakespeare has disappeared from their menu, at least for this summer, the company offers a pleasant change of pace in Philip Barry’s “Holiday” and Moliere’s “The Imaginary Invalid.”……Elm Shakespeare’s handsome production, smoothly guided by Artistic Director James Andreassi, offers an entertaining, diverting evening. Barry’s dialogue is sprightly and amusing, though his lines would benefit from an all-round tightening. The company is blessed with veteran actor Alvin Epstein as the family patriarch, giving his predictably fine performance. In other feature roles both Tamara Hickey and Keely Baisden shine, while Eric Martin Brown offers an engaging portrayal of Ned.

for full review go to:
http://www.nytheaterscene.com/RevCHoliday.html

Elm Shakespeare's 'Matchmaker' a lovely evening in the park
New Haven Register - By E. Kyle Minor 08/14/2008

NEW HAVEN - With all due respect to Jerry Herman and Michael Stewart, "Hello Dolly!" isn't a great musical. If one uses the stringent criterion that musicals derived from established properties should improve on their source material to rank among the great, then so long "Dolly!"

Just take a gander at The Elm Shakespeare Company's current production of Thornton Wilder's 1955 romantic farce "The Matchmaker," which Herman and Stewart converted into "Hello, Dolly!"

The energetic production, directed by Elm Shakespeare Artistic Director James Andreassi, proves that Wilder's under-served work is a beautifully crafted comedy that builds in laughter while scattering genuine pearls of wisdom along the way.

"The Matchmaker," running in repertory with "Hamlet" through Aug. 31 at Edgerton Park ("Hamlet" starts tonight), stands a distant third behind Wilder's "Our Town" (1938) and "The Skin of Our Teeth" (1942), both Pulitzer Prize winners and regarded as profound beyond Broadway's standards.

"The Matchmaker," which initially appeared on Broadway in 1938 as a one-act called "The Merchant of Yonkers," has been overshadowed and under-represented by "Hello, Dolly!" since Carol Channing first donned her red dress and fluttering boas. What Andreassi's production proves is that "The Matchmaker" is arguably as profound as "The Skin of Our Teeth" and funnier than its musical adaptation, which seems to unintentionally trivialize Wilder's wisdom and sentimentalize the Master's light touch.

Andreassi deals himself an ace in the title role, with Elm Shakespeare veteran Lisa Bostnar a beguiling Dolly Levi. Looking radiant in Elizabeth Bolster's exquisite costumes, Bostnar's Dolly manipulates Wilder's delightfully foolish characters without any of them remotely aware that she controls their destiny. Bostnar completes the characterization with ample comic timing and earnest humanity.

Michael Peter Smith is an aptly impatient and tightfisted Horace Vandergelder, Dolly's unwitting but ultimately willing prey. Raphael Massie's amiable Cornelius Hack and Ian McQuillan-Grace's impeccably clownish Barnaby Tucker serve as perfect foils for their employer Vandergelder and suitable beaux for Tamara Hickey's impish Irene Malloy and Samantha Mashaw's innocent Minnie Fay.

Andreassi pulls another ace from his sleeve when Elm Shakespeare regular Allyn Burrows shows up in Act III as Miss Flora Van Huysen. Though a female traditionally performs the role, Burrows gets deeper laughs as his presence adds resonance to the character's lines.

"The Matchmaker" is a delightful night out for all.

E. Kyle Minor of Danbury is a freelance writer. 

Elm Shakespeare's 'Hamlet" is a finely acted must-see
New Haven Register - By E. Kyle Minor 08/17/2008

NEW HAVEN — Tackling Shakespeare's "Hamlet," often regarded as the greatest play ever, is a daunting endeavor for any theater company — especially an American one. Whether the group in question is the Public Theater in New York, or a small, professional summer theater group, audiences bring tall expectations.

The Elm Shakespeare Company, which just added "Hamlet" to its season of rotating repertory (with Thornton Wilder's "The Matchmaker"), offers its engaging and accessible rendition, starring the versatile Elm Shakespeare regular Allyn Burrows as the Melancholy Dane. Coming in at a brisk two-and-a-half-hours (no intermission), the production is by no means Spinach Theater ("eat it — it's good for you!"), but rather a good, old melodrama where the audience champs at the bit to see its hero avenge his pater's murder while overcoming iconic inner conflict and a formidable adversary, the nefarious Claudius.

"Hamlet," which barrels along through Aug. 31 at Edgerton Park, has the added attraction of Alvin Epstein, making his Elm Shakespeare Company debut as Polonius. It is indeed a pleasure to hear this most accomplished performer of the classics speak his character's fatherly advice to his son, Laertes, and daughter, Ophelia.

Epstein is well met by the rest of the cast, too, especially the principal actors whose classical training serves them aptly. In addition to Burrows' swift-thinking Hamlet, Mark Zeisler is a cool, considerate Claudius who, with the obvious exception of when he watches his horrific murder acted out in the play-within-a-play, hides his dastardly deeds behind a trustworthy facade of compassion. Similarly, Lisa Bostnar underplays Gertrude so that subtext is paramount.

Ted Hewlett's quick-tempered Laertes counterpoints Burrows' Hamlet nicely. Tamara Hickey's Ophelia credibly spirals from lovely innocent to off the wall without going over the top. Raphael Massie's Horatio is so genuinely devoted to Hamlet that he reveals no sign of acting.

This is true of all the principals, whose style is more heightened reality than affectation. It's worth seeing them all in both "Hamlet" and "The Matchmaker," as director James Andreassi smartly cast them in completely opposite roles between the two shows (check out Michael Peter Smith, a delightfully Player King and common Grave Digger in "Hamlet," as well as a testy Horace Vandergelder in "The Matchmaker" — indeed, a Horace of a different color).

The production design complements the performers modestly but effectively, especially Elizabeth Bolster's mostly modern-day costumes, where Claudius' contemporary suit fits right in with Hamlet's classic black and Laertes' old-style martial garb.

E. Kyle Minor of Danbury is a freelance writer.

Shakespeare is Alive and Well
New Haven Register

In an entertainment world increasingly dominated by "superstars," whose talents are mainly in the clever phrases of their publicists or the depth of their cleavage, it's nice to see some local people making it on the strength of their artistic talents.

Such is the case with the Elm Shakespeare Company, a New Haven-based, nonprofit group that since 1996 has been introducing local audiences to the works of the immortal English playwright. The company produces a Shakespearean work each summer in an outdoor venue at Edgerton Park to the delight of a steadily increasing audience.

In addition, the company is doing its part to educate children and the public in general by conducting arts workshops in local high schools and offering internship programs for those who wish to get involved in theater.

And, at a time when a night at the theater has become an expensive proposition, the company stages its productions free of charge with nothing more than a request for donations.

All-in-all, the company provides a welcome relief to so much of the canned, packaged and overpriced entertainment that we have become accustomed to in recent years. The proof of that is in the company's attendance figures.

When the performances first began, the company drew crowds of not more than 200 to 300 people. The past summer, the company's 19-day run of "Othello" drew approximately 30,000 people, with a final evening crowd of 4,000 and no audience of fewer than 600 people. Other productions have included " The Tempest" and "The Taming of the Shrew."

The success of this grassroots effort seems to suggest that, despite television's obsession with so-called "reality" programs where the reality is akin to that of a $3 bill, there is a large group of people who enjoy authentic theater and are hungry for drama - comedies and tragedies alike - written by masters of art and produced by skilled actors and actresses.

The Shakespeare Company has just announced that for the first time, it is making plans to branch out. The expansion will include a week of performances on the Green in Guilford under the sponsorship of the Shoreline Alliance for the Arts. Next summer, the company will perform in Guilford during the first week in August followed by its usual three-week run in New Haven. The Shoreline Alliance is to be congratulated for recognizing the value of the company.

Hopefully, the expansion to Guilford will be only the first step in bringing the company's works to audiences in other communities throughout Connecticut.